Lawyer Calls Celebrities Massage Parlor Customers

By Robert MeyersOctober 28, 1978

An attorney for a leading massage parlor figure said yesterday in U.S. District Court in Alexandria that a prominent area politician, a professional footabll player, and a famous musician were among customers who paid for sexual services offered by a Northern Virginia-based prostitution ring.

The statement was made by the attorney William J. Temple, to support his contention that the government has been selectively prosecuting only "middle level" massage parlor employes and notprosecuting prostitutes and clients, whose actions Temple said also violate federal antiracketeering laws.

Temple asked U.S. District Court Judge Albert V. Bryan Jr., to be lenient in sentencing his client, Gary Marion Van Ryzin, a middle-level employe of what has been called Washington's largest and most sophisticated prostitution business.

Van Ryrin, 38, had earlier pleaded quilty to one court of interstate racketeering in connection with the operation of 11 massage parlors and outcall massage services run by Michael Louis Parrish, a reclusive 30-year-old Fairfax County man known as "The Old Man," according to the FBI.

"I don't think it's fair to send (Van Ryzin) to prison" because he admitted helping run a prostitution operation when prostitutues and their clients are not being prosecuted, Temple said.

Temple then named the politician, the football player, and the musician, and said, "these people have charged massages (using credit cards and ordered) girls across state lines" for the purpose of prostitution, acts that the lawyer said made them just as culpable.

Judge Bryan, whose face reddened as Temple named the three, said that Van Ryzin's actions warranted incarceration, and sentenced him to four months in prison. Van Ryzin had faced a maximum of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The two individuals named, and a spokesman for the third, yesterday denied the charges.

"I am disturbed" by the use of individuals' names, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Henry Hudson outside the courtroom yesterday. Temple offered no documents in court to support his contention that they had been customers.

Hudson denied the government was selectively prosecuting middle-level management people, since he said the probe of Parrish's operation's "still in the investigative stages."

Two weeks ago Clyde Ballard (Skip) Stovall, a Parrish employe, was sentenced by Bryan to four months in prison following his guilty plea to a smiliar racketeering charge. Next Darlene Paige, who has also pleaded guilty to racketeering in connection with the operation, is scheduled to be sentenced by Bryan.